Favreau talks Iron Man

Elf helmer looking for unknown to suit up for possible Marvel franchise

One glance at the CV of actor/writer/director/producer Jon Favreau and the word ‘colourful’ leaps to mind.

The one-time Friends guest star wrote cheques for Elijah Wood footy ‘n’ fists feature Green Street and wrote the script for hip, cult flick Swingers – and as we told you a while back, now he’s sitting behind the camera for Marvel on their first independently produced movie.

“It's the first movie Marvel is self-financing, we're set to come out in the summer of '08, and we'll start shooting in January,” the Fav recently told MTV .

Eager to ensure that the fanboys don’t get shirty, JF isn’t going to repeat Joel Schumacher’s ‘Batsuit with nipples’ fiasco.

“We're going to have it take place in the present day, but there will be an origin story that has the old, grey Iron Man suit; eventually it will progress into more of the modern look,” Favreau said. “That's the fun of doing the first one.”

The comic books followed the story of super-wealthy inventor Tony Stark, who creates the suit after an accident leaves him with a heart defect. Stark has no super-powers but the armour has a built in mechanism that keeps his heart beating. Later in the graphic novel series, Stark’s company was taken from him and he turned to drink.

“The alcoholism doesn't come into play until later on in the story of Iron Man,” Favreau points out. "It started off in the '60s, where it was about him as a successful manufacturer who developed this suit. Then, later, it spins off into that story about him fighting against himself. I think we're going to lay the groundwork for it, but the first one's going to explore him taking on this alter ego of Iron Man, and developing the suit.”

Favreau will be working from a script by Matthew Holloway and Arthur Marcum, the men behind 2004 thriller Shadow Of Fear.

Keep those eyes trained at totalfilm.com for any cast iron updates… geddit? This power would be lethal in the wrong hands…